For the workshop with legendary field recordist and former Cabaret Voltaire member Chris Watson at the 2018 Meakusma Festival, there are still a few places available.

Chris Watson needs no introduction. After leaving Cabaret Voltaire in 1981, he set out on a career as a field recordist specialized in natural history. His work is mostly released on the Touch label. He also works for television, radio and makes installations. He also does work for computer games.

Participants to the workshop will meet with and be taken on a sound walk and night recording session in the High Fens by Chris Watson and Mike Harding of the Touch label. Afterwards, an audio CD will be published using the recordings.

We are proud to have Watson and Harding over at the festival as their presence and the planned CD with audience participation is very much what the Meakusma Festival wishes to stand for.

This the first CD released by drøne, after two vinyl albums on Anna von Hausswolff’s label, Pomperipossa. In a 5” jacket with artwork and font by nico, who also provided the hand-written text for the vinyl artwork for the 2015 and 2016 releases, “Mappa Mundi” traces and describes audio surrounding and occupying the planet earth.

Workers toil in smithies, call signs and chants-at-prayer reveal attempts to order the chaos, which always remains one step ahead. Post-lapsarian for sure, but smoke signals and drums have morphed into the ‘bing bong’ of the attention-grabbing, mind-polluting PA system. The coded simplicity of the whistle (“Start!”) has evolved into a more deliberate attempt to control rather than inform by explicit, structured language. Announcements have become commands; signs bark orders. Thus ‘no’ becomes a powerful rejection, rather than merely a preference; and no-ers are more easily to spot… “You’re going the wrong way”! (To which the only sensitive and mature response is: “Good!”)

Call signs, IDs, audio sigils and signatures all combine to describe a polluted, confusing atmosphere which threatens to leave us powerless and bewildered. “Decipher the sounds and you win the game! First prize is, guess what? You get to take the audio poison! Congratulations! You’ve lost!”.

The first album, ‘reversing into the future’ drew this response from Lend Me Your Ears: “This thrilling piece – surely the most kinetic non-dancefloor record in an age”. Anna herself wrote of the follow up record, ‘a perfect blind’: “I love everything about this release. Such a great presentation and exciting project! And most important: the music is sublime.”

The Quietus wrote: “Last year’s distinctive debut from drøne was likened to a hurtling journey. It’s combination of field recordings, shortwave radio and modular synths possessed an excited, driving energy whose route was hitherto unexplored and destination unknowable. But with an expanded sound pool boasting instruments across the ages – from guitar, through pipe organ and strings to dulcimer and psaltery – its follow-up takes a sideways step into more cognizant, reflective pastures.”

Side A this strange life l ::: 19:53
Side B this strange life ll ::: 19:57

Pomperipossa Records, curated by Anna von Hausswolff, is delighted to announce the forthcoming release of the first album by drøne. Field recordings, short wave radio, modular synth all combine to form an enticing, arresting, moving journey of electrically-charged dissonance, drones and electronic melodies… Anna calls it “a jewel”.

“A very hot day in the hills above Los Angeles… only possible to work in the mornings because of the sweltering afternoon heat, so all a bit frantic, but with a kink in time. There is no wifi-controlled air conditioning; the car is electric-powered and charging up. It has barely rained for months, (if not years) and the hoses are working overtime. Its an analogue session; Mark’s modular synth set up is working furiously and overheating. We are pushing sounds through and seeing what works… and things gradually take shape. The forms seem to determine themselves; how much control do we have? How much do we want? Some peculiar things start to happen and the haze bends. Some of the sounds seem alive and are quick to reform as we struggle to contain them, like trying to stuff snakes into a bag. The sounds moan and sing, forming their own phonemes.”

Sonva is a Cornish word meaning a ‘place of sound’ and is the name of the Research Group and the Music community at large at Falmouth University.
From analogue to digital…and back?

Mike Harding introduces Touch (1982-2016+), an art project which has witnessed much change in the world of sound and its relationship not only to art but also how the “real world” of studios, record stores and distribution has changed; how perception of the role of artists, now largely dominated by public funding, has shifted. He will look at the way artists have adapted to working in a digital environment (even if the essence of the work is analogue) and how they see themselves and their role, and also the role the growing number of female artists has played and the influence this is having on the artistic community.

He will look specifically at the work of Chris Watson, Jana Winderen, Hildur Gudnadottir, BJNilsen, Philip Jeck and Christian Fennesz, all artists with whom he has a long-standing relationship. Mike will also discuss copyright and the realities of a world where music has virtually lost all monetary value, and how this unfolded. He will also look at what can go wrong, often more illustrative than what goes right, with an historical glance at the incompatibilities of the laws and digital technology…

Mike will also introduce the students to “freq_out”, a project created and curated by CM von Hausswolff, which asks them to participate in a collaborative frequency experiment which will be presented by them at the end of the period.

About

After University (Durham, Modern History), worked at ZigZag. He has been running the audio-visual label Touch for 35 years and counting, and in this period has acquired much experience and information on disseminating cultural sounds to a wider audience - see also Touch Radio and Long Wave (see opposite)